| 1 |
IN the course of time, Mr Earnshaw began to fail.
He had been active and healthy, yet his strength left him suddenly;
and when he was confined to the chimney-corner he grew grievously
irritable.
A nothing vexed him, and suspected slights of his authority nearly
threw him into fits.
| 2 |
This was especially to be remarked if any one attempted to impose
upon, or domineer over his favourite: he was painfully jealous lest
a word should be spoken amiss to him, seeming to have got into his
head the notion that, because he liked Heathcliff, all hated, and
longed to do him an ill-turn.
| | 3 |
It was a disadvantage to the lad, for the kinder among us did not
wish to fret the master, so we humoured his partiality; and that
humouring was rich nourishment to the child's pride and black
tempers.
Still it became in a manner necessary; twice, or thrice, Hindley's
manifestation of scorn, while his father was near, roused the old
man to a fury.
He seized his stick to strike him, and shook with rage that he
could not do it.
| | 4 |
At last, our curate, (we had a curate then who made the living
answer by teaching the little Lintons and Earnshaws, and farming
his bit of land himself,) he advised that the young man should be
sent to college, and Mr Earnshaw agreed, though with a heavy
spirit, for he said --
| | 5 |
"Hindley was nought, and would never thrive as where he wandered."
| | 6 |
I hoped heartily we should have peace now.
It hurt me to think the master should be made uncomfortable by his
own good deed.
his family disagreements, as he would have it that it did --
really, you know, sir, it was in his sinking frame.
| | 7 |
We might have got on tolerably, notwithstanding; but, for two
people, Miss Cathy, and Joseph, the servant; you saw him, I dare
say, up yonder.
He was, and is yet, most likely, the wearisomest, self-righteous
pharisee that ever ransacked a bible to rake the promises to
himself, and fling the curses on his neighbours.
By his knack of sermonizing and pious discoursing, he contrived to
make a great impression on Mr Earnshaw, and, the more feeble the
master became, the more influence he gained.
| | 8 |
He was relentless in worrying him about his soul's concerns, and
about ruling his children rigidly.
He encouraged him to regard Hindley as a reprobate; and, night
after night, he regularly grumbled out a long string of tales
against Heathcliff and Catherine; always minding to flatter
Earnshaw's weakness by heaping the heaviest blame on the last.
| | 9 |
Certainly, she had ways with her such as I never saw a child take
up before; and she put all of us past our patience fifty times and
oftener in a day: from the hour she came down stairs, till the hour
she went to bed, we had not a minute's security that she wouldn't
be in mischief.
Her spirits were always at high-water mark, her tongue always going
-- singing, laughing, and plaguing everybody who would not do the
same.
A wild, wicked slip she was -- but, she had the bonniest eye, and
sweetest smile, and lightest foot in the parish; and, after all, I
believe she meant no harm; for when once she made you cry in good
earnest, it seldom happened that she would not keep you company;
and oblige you to be quiet that you might comfort her.
| | 10 |
She was much too fond of Heathcliff.
The greatest punishment we could invent for her was to keep her
separate from him: yet, she got chided more than any of us on his
| | 11 |
In play, she liked, exceedingly, to act the little mistress; using
her hands freely, and commanding her companions: she did so to me,
but I would not bear slapping, and ordering; and so I let her know.
| | 12 |
Now, Mr Earnshaw did not understand jokes from his children: he had
always been strict and grave with them; and Catherine, on her part,
had no idea why her father should be crosser and less patient in
his ailing condition, than he was in his prime.
| | 13 |
His peevish reproofs wakened in her a naughty delight to provoke
him; she was never so happy as when we were all scolding her at
once, and she defying us with her bold, saucy look, and her ready
words; turning Joseph's religious curses into ridicule, baiting me,
and doing just what her father hated most, showing how her
pretended insolence, which he thought real, had more power over
Heathcliff than his kindness.
How the boy would do her bidding in anything, and
his only when it suited his own inclination.
| | 14 |
After behaving as badly as possible all day, she sometimes came
fondling to make it up at night.
| | 15 |
"Nay, Cathy," the old man would say, "I cannot love thee; thou'rt
worse than thy brother.
Go, say thy prayers, child, and ask God's pardon.
I doubt thy mother and I must rue that we ever reared thee!"
| | 16 |
That made her cry, at first; and then, being repulsed continually
hardened her, and she laughed if I told her to say she was sorry
for her faults, and beg to be forgiven.
| | 17 |
But the hour came, at last, that ended Mr Earnshaw's troubles on
earth.
He died quietly in his chair one October evening, seated by the
fire-side.
| | 18 |
A high wind blustered round the house, and roared in the chimney:
it sounded wild and stormy, yet it was not cold, and we were all
together -- I, a little removed from the hearth, busy at my
knitting, and Joseph reading his Bible near the table, (for the
work was done.)
Miss Cathy had been sick, and that made her still; she leant
against her father's knee, and Heathcliff was lying on the floor
with his head in her lap.
| | 19 |
I remember the master, before he fell into a doze, stroking her
bonny hair--it pleased him rarely to see her gentle--and saying--
| | 20 |
"Why canst thou not always be a good lass, Cathy?"
| | 21 |
And she turned her face up to his, and laughed, and answered --
| | 22 |
"Why cannot you always be a good man, father?"
| | 23 |
But as soon as she saw him vexed again, she kissed his hand, and
said she would sing him to sleep.
She began singing very low, till his fingers dropped from hers, and
his head sank on his breast.
Then I told her to hush, and not stir, for fear she should wake
him.
We all kept as mute as mice a full half-hour, and should have done
longer, only Joseph, having finished his chapter, got up and said
that he must rouse the master for prayers and bed.
He stepped forward, and called him by name, and touched his
shoulder, but he would not move--so he took the candle and looked
at him.
| | 24 |
I thought there was something wrong as he set down the light; and
seizing the children each by an arm, whispered them to "frame up-
stairs, and make little din--they might pray alone that evening--he
had summut to do."
| | 25 |
"I shall bid father good-night first," said Catherine, putting her
arms round his neck, before we could hinder her.
| | 26 |
The poor thing discovered her loss directly--she screamed out--
| | 27 |
"Oh, he's dead, Heathcliff! he's dead!"
| | 28 |
And they both set up a heart-breaking cry.
| | 29 |
I joined my wail to theirs, loud and bitter; but Joseph asked what
we could be thinking of to roar in that way over a saint in Heaven.
| | 30 |
He told me to put on my cloak and run to Gimmerton for the doctor
and the parson.
I could not guess the use that either would be of, then.
However, I went, through wind and rain, and brought one, the
doctor, back with me; the other said he would come in the morning.
| | 31 |
Leaving Joseph to explain matters, I ran to the children's room;
their door was ajar, I saw they had never laid down, though it was
past midnight; but they were calmer, and did not need me to console
them.
The little souls were comforting each other with better thoughts
than I could have hit on; no parson in the world ever pictured
Heaven so beautifully as they did, in their innocent talk; and,
while I sobbed, and listened, I could not help wishing we were all
there safe together.
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